My nine years old niece, who is attending the CM2 (equivalent to 4th grade in the US), approached me and asked if I could help her understand a few concepts from her social studies book. She was eager to know what human/civil rights are, and as citizens, what our obligations are. I took her book and put it aside. I grabbed a magazine from the stack of publications I pile up by my desk once a week. The magazine was “nishan.” It had a picture of Yacoubi, moments after he shot and wounded Tariq Mouhib
, sitting in the passenger side of his Infiniti SUV being driven to safety by a plain-clothed police officer. I showed her a picture of the victim and explained that all citizens have a right to respect. The right to respect is key in a democratic society; its absence would lead to chaos. If Hassan Yacoubi had respected Tariq Mouhib, he wouldn’t have insulted then shot and kicked him.
“So ”respect” is both a right and an obligation!” She commented to show me that she understood.
“Right! But there is more to it. Tariq Mouhib has a right to be protected and defended by the government which has an obligation to put his assailant behind bars. These are standard operating principles in any democratic country.”
When Hassan Yacoubi, who happens to be the husband of Lalla Aicha, the aunt of king Mohammed VI, was whisked off from the public eye by the police on September 9, and sent later on to an undisclosed European country to unwind, the absence of a strategic intent by the Moroccan government to democratize its institutions was confirmed. By its shameless reluctance to present Hassan Yacoubi to justice to answer for his unprovoked assault on Tariq Mouhib, the Moroccan government, a characteristically nepotist regime, espouses the belief that most Moroccans are subservient to an elite that is above the law. In the meanwhile, Tariq Mohib has been sequestered in a hospital in Casablanca. He has been subjected to tremendous pressure to relinquish his right to see Yacoubi indicted for his crime. To the exception of his mother, uniformed and plain-clothed police officers under orders from the highest levels of their chain of command barred him from having contacts with anyone else.
All the democratic indicators in Morocco, such as elections, political opposition groups, freedom of expression, serve to reinforce the illusion of government stability. When Khaled Naciri, the official spokesperson of the Moroccan government, was recently asked by a journalist for an update on the case, he stated, frustrated he was being queried, that judicial proceedings are being followed. How legal are proceedings that authorize the culprit to roam free under government protection and the victim be detained? Such is governed a country in which the democratic process has systematically failed in its infancy. The long-term prospect of a stable democracy requires strong cultural changes Morocco lacks at the moment. Indeed, democracy was introduced in Morocco not by popular pressure on the government, by rather thanks to a royal initiative. Such an initiative came at the behest of international organizations and European and US governments. It should come as no surprise then when the government and the Royal Cabinet is disinclined to enforce democratic principles that infringe with its absolute authority.
Hassan Yacoubi will never step into a court of law. Democracy will never flourish in a country where the government treats its citizens unequally.
“Is Mr. Mouhib going to die?” my niece asked me.
“Not unless he is swatted by an elite swat again. And you too should watch out for the big swat,” I warned.
“I’m not a fly.”
I thought: Yes, you are! The day you come face to face with one of our demigods of Yacoubi’s ilk, you will realize it.
“Of course not,” I said smiling.
A. T. B. Copyright © 2008
